3 Fat Chicks on a Diet Weight Loss Community - Emotional coping techniques

Quote:

Originally Posted by Locke (Post 4971986)

Hello beautiful people :)

I have a question about a psychological problem that I'm facing right now. Basically I've given up all of my harmful behaviors that ultimately hurt me in the long run. I feel overwhelmed right now. I'm tired, stressed, and I just can't cope with my life as it is at this moment. I feel trapped. All of my coping behaviors, the stuff in my tool box that I've used in the past are bad- binge eating, purging, drinking, drugging, cutting, self-abuse, pulling my hair out, etc. I'm trying not to use those as ways to cope anymore, but now I just feel trapped. I have uncomfortable feelings and I just don't know what to do. I want to avoid pain, frustration, anger, etc. but I don't know what to do. Has anybody else felt this way? Do you have a healthy way of coping?

I'm stuck on this too. For 20yrs I have programmed myself to relegate any uncomfortable feeling over to hunger. Eating seems to be the only coping mechanism I have. And it works so well, I don't even know where to begin to change it. It works so well in fact that I always identify it as hunger and nothing else, I'm willing to bet money that I'm just hungry. It's only after I eat that I realize that I had used food to aleviate my anxiety that I felt over xyz issue. And even now that I know that I STILL identify my anxiety as hunger. I don't know what it will take to change that.

Over the past few months I've begun to incorporate chi gong into my daily routine. I find myself resorting to it in times of distress and I feel like it has an impact. I think I will have a look into tennis4ever's suggestion of dr. Chawla, it sounds interesting at the least.